Now, the curvy star of “We Bought a Zoo” is carrying Obama’s water for his 2012 campaign.

Johansson announced she’s back on Team Obama, reading off the Celebrity Apology script while chatting to The Huffington Post about her return to the Hope and Change Express:

I think people are really in dire straits and they are very reasonably and understandably upset,” she said. “I mean Obama inherited a turkey, he really did, and he’s working to… he’s fighting a kind of uphill battle in a sense and he has these past four years. And he never ran his first term as that — he was always going to be a two-term election in that sense. And change doesn’t happen overnight, you know, we know that.

Change doesn’t happen overnight. He inherited a mess. Johansson doesn’t miss a beat, although she neglected to mention the phony, “those dern Republicans won’t let him get anything done” talking point.

There’s always take two, right?

—–

As the story begins, Benjamin Mee  (Matt Damon) is referred to as “a writer who specializes in adventure.” His career as a journalist, however,  is sidetracked when he loses his wife six months before the story begins.

Ben eventually quits his job and decides to move his family to a new location, but his bid to buy a house turns into an adventure itself. He falls in love with a large semi-secluded home that comes equipped with a fully-staffed zoo. Although his brother (Thomas Haden Church) rejects the idea, Ben decides to buy the house/zoo and try to open up his very own animal kingdom.

Based on a true story and directed by Cameron Crowe, “Zoo” had a lot of potential. Crowe, who previously directed “Jerry Maguire” and “Almost Famous,” has a knack for presenting idealistic individuals who face new realities when their lives change abruptly. “Zoo” is no different from that. As Ben grieves his wife, he’s also trying to balance raising children by himself and opening up a zoo.

It’s unfortunate, then, when the story takes a turn for the silly. A subplot involving Ben and Dylan (Colin Ford), his rebellious son, provides a perfect example of where this film derails. After the family moves, Dylan accidentally leaves a box of newly-arrived snakes open. In a plot device that has been seen on an endless number of sitcoms, the snakes find their way out of the box and they all seem to nestle at the Mee’s front door. If this plot device isn’t bad enough, the arguments that erupt between Ben and Dylan about this and other incidents are overtly melodramatic and nearly unwatchable.

Added to that is the overloaded plot that leaves little room for the development of any interesting relationships. In addition to the relationship between the father and son, “Zoo”  focuses on Ben’s burgeoning relationship with an overworked zookeeper, played by Scarlett Johansson. The story also finds room to include a relationship between Dylan and a local girl in town and Ben and an older tiger in the zoo. There are just too many different plots in “Zoo”, though, and the story gets lost so that when a payoff or a conclusion arrives, it doesn’t feel earned.

One of the few positive aspects of this film is Church, who is the logical brother who constantly questions his brother’s decisions. Church, who earned an Oscar nomination for “Sideways,” is an underrated actor who often settles for supporting roles. I wish this movie had more of a role for him here, but it’s too jam-packed to give this undervalued actor a real chance to shine.

Two’s company and three’s a crowd, but this movie—with its numerous storylines and underdeveloped relationships—feels like a zoo indeed.

But the actress known in the tabloids as ScarJo isn’t ready to give them a complete pass.

Johansson told Interview Magazine via Politico that she wishes the OWS types would deliver a more refined message:

Johansson said that while “it’s important to shed light on something like that,” she called the [OWS] message “sort of unclear.” “I mean, yes, people are fed up—and I think quite rightfully so. But what are they proposing as an alternative to just being upset or feeling disillusioned or abandoned? That kind of protest movement really needs to happen on a much bigger scale, but there needs to be a clearer message,” said the actress.

Most people find the OWS message crystal clear – down with capitalism and pay my student loans now. But give the actress credit for breaking from the liberal orthodoxy – if only by a few critical degrees.

Megan Fox adjusts her "talent" before their next scene.

1. Dear Hollywood: Stop The Age Discrimination

Age discrimination is a problem in Hollywood. Seriously, what is the fascination with jamming twenty-somethings into every role? It doesn’t work. These young girls simply don’t have the maturity or the depth to play the parts of women. It strains credibility beyond the breaking point when they cast some silicon enhanced girl to play the nuclear scientist or the head of a corporation or. . . well, any woman in a position of authority. I know powerful women, professional women, and women with a great deal of maturity, and none of them look or act anything like Hollywood seems to think.

And please stop casting girls as the wives of old, old, old male actors. It’s creepy. Teri Garr and Richard Dreyfuss worked in Close Encounters because they looked like a couple. Septuagenarian Harrison Ford married to Megan Fox doesn’t. Not only can we not see them getting together in the first place, but we can’t see them as a “normal, loving couple.” Instead, the words “gold digger” and “cradle robber” and even “grave robber” come to mind. And holy cow, stop casting “mothers” who are only a year or two older than their movie “daughters.” Was there a plague in Hollywood that wiped out all the women over 40?

2. Dear Hollywood: Stop Cloning Actresses

Hollywood also needs to end its cloning experiments. It needs to stop rejecting actresses if they have the slightest trace of individuality or if their bone structure is 1% off the model. Seriously, this makes it impossible to cast people who look the part. Forget the nuclear scientist mentioned above, what about the average waitress or the mother of three or the cop? Real women don’t look, act or dress like Malibu Strip Club Barbie™. This is the female equivalent of casting only musclemen as extras, and is again kinda creepy.

"We are the Borg. We are ready for our close up."

More importantly, by casting clones, Hollywood guarantees that few modern actresses will be memorable because it’s the distinct actors we remember. Indeed, few of the top male actors fall into the “pretty boy” category. Outside of a Redford, a DiCaprio, or a Cruise, few leading men look anything like male models. Bogart was a small man with a crooked face and a lisp. Stallone looks like he lost a fight with a blender. Bruce Willis beat the blender, but it took 12 rounds. Jack Nicholson is the blender. How about James Cagney, DeNiro, Bill Murray, Charles Bronson, Steven McQueen, Clive Owen, Benicio Del Toro, Alan Rickman, Adrien Brody, Daniel Day-Lewis, Dustin Hoffman, Tommy Lee Jones, Richard Dreyfuss, etc. . . not a standard profile in the bunch. And when you get into character actors, the defects and distinctions multiply. . . Steve Buscemi anyone?

I’ll bet you could visualize each of these men as you read the names. Why? Because these men are memorable. They weren’t cast because they are pretty to look at, they were cast because they are distinct — they stand out both in looks and personality.

Believe it or not, the same thing has always been true with the great actresses as well. Look at the actresses we remember. Few of them can be called “classic beauties”: Lauren Bacall was rather butch, as was Katharine Hepburn, and is Sigourney Weaver. Lucille Ball was hardly a looker. Sophia Loren and Julie Andrews were beautiful, but not in a beauty queen sort of way. Loren was gorgeous and wild. Andrews had “girl next door” beauty. Betty Davis, Barbara Eden and Angela Lansbury all looked 60 the moment they were born. We remember these actresses because they stood out, i.e. because they were different. What’s more, we feel we know them because their personalities come across so strongly on the screen.

Now tell me how many of these you can visualize: Scarlet Johansson, Kate Hudson, Rosie Whitely, Cate Blanchett, Elisha Cuthbert, Rachel McAdams, Kristen Stewart, Jessica Biel, and Elizabeth Shue Banks. I doubt most people could pick them out of a line up and none of them have memorable personalities. In fact, most actresses today are so interchangeable that I wonder if anyone would notice if you swapped a couple out in the middle of the film. . . “hey, weren’t you blonder before?” And even when they do stand out, it’s usually for the wrong reasons: Megan Fox. . . idiot, Lindsay Lohan. . . train wreck, Anne Hathaway. . . bleached by aliens.

Unfortunately, because Hollywood is looking purely for beauty, they aren’t finding great actresses anymore. To me, the test of a great actor/actress is whether or not they could have taken on a great role. For example, could any of the actor/actresses listed above replace any of the guys in Glengarry Glen Ross? The male actors listed above could have done it. Hepburn, Bacall, Weaver, Davis, Eden and Lansbury could have done it. . . Julie Andrews, probably not. But what about the modern actresses just listed? Don’t make me laugh. Nor could any of them have taken over for Bacall in To Have and Have Not or Hepburn in The African Queen. Sure, they can all take over Megan Fox’s role in Transformers or whoever’s role in the next romantic comedy, but that’s about it.

3. Dear Hollywood: Stop Lying About Strong Roles

Finally, we come to the issue of strong roles. Hollywood actresses have complained for some time about a lack of strong roles for women in Hollywood. I think their complaints are valid. But Hollywood doesn’t know how to fix the problem. So instead, they try to redefine the problem. Now we’re told about an El Guapo-like plethora of strong roles involving action heroines. But this is nothing but el toro kaka public relations.

Imagine you are a director and you want your daughter to have a “strong role” in your film. Here you are describing the role: “Basically, you put on a tight leather cat suit and some S&M gear. Then you run around shooting at people and flashing your chest and your butt. I will collect money from men who will reeeally enjoy watching you jiggle and bounce across the screen. Sound good pumpkin?”

"For an extra $10, I'll do an empowerment table dance."

Hollywood apparently sees no problem with this, as that pretty much describes most roles given to female action stars. But how is this a strong role? These women are acting out an adolescent male sexual fantasy. They might as well be in Hustler.

A strong role is one you would be proud to let people watch. It involves playing a character that either brings out strong emotions in the audience or it involves being the kind of person people respect. That means using your wits and maintaining your moral code in the face of adversity and pressure to surrender. It means overcoming the obstacles you face through strength of character. The leather-clad dominatrixes and slinky spies are not demonstrating some strength of character within themselves, they’re selling sex.

Mommas don’t let your daughters grow up to be actresses. . .

Am I right? What actresses would you say are great? And don’t you find it a little bit strange that a place as liberal as Hollywood would be so openly sexist and ageist? Hmmm.

Via Yahoo:

“I feel incredibly honored to have been invited to the Marine Corps Ball by Sgt. Dustin L. Williams,” Johansson said in a statement to Zap2It. “Not only does Sgt. Williams deserve recognition for his bravery, selflessness and dedication to the United States and its people, but he also displays a cheeky talent for film making. Sgt. Williams, unfortunately due to prior commitments I will not be able to attend the Ball with you this year but I am sending you a case of Moet and Chandon with gratitude. In my absence, I raise a glass to you and all the men and women of the U.S. Marine Corps, past and present, in thanks for your continued commitment to preserving the safety of our nation.”

A kind and gracious response, no?

It sounds like Williams will be understanding of Johansson’s conflict.

He told Zap2It before learning of Johansson’s reply, “If I was told she could not attend, I would understand. I would not believe the invitation would be denied without good cause. With her current career I would imagine Scarlett Johansson is a busy woman.”

Full story here.

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Thanks to Scott for the heads up.

—–

Via the left-wing Politico:

“A cancer that goes undetected, a sexually transmitted disease left untreated, a woman unable to get the birth control she needs to plan her family and take control of her own destiny. This is the disastrous vision of some leaders in the United States Health of Representatives,” Johansson says in a new YouTube video. “Every year, Planned Parenthood provides this essential care to millions of women, men and teens. For many people — especially those with low incomes — Planned Parenthood is their only source of health care. Let your members of Congress know where you stand.”

Translation:

“Even though I have more money than the God I don’t believe in, taxpayers should still foot the bill to murder the innocent unborn, especially the disproportionally Black innocent unborn. When I say essential care to millions of women, I mean killing babies. When I say health care, I mean killing babies. When I say STDs, I mean killing babies. When I say birth control, you better believe I mean killing babies. I’m a movie star mostly known for my awesome body but I want to be taken seriously and so even though there’s hunger in the world, war, disease, and slavery — this is my issue. Killing babies.

 Has anyone seen my smart-girl glasses? They were right here.”

More here.

The list of films I’m literally counting down the days to see each summer gets shorter every year. This is either due to my advancing middle age or Hollywood’s advancing suckery. Regardless, few films were as pure pleasure of a surprise as the original “Iron Man,” which seemed to come out of nowhere in 2007 and knock us all out. Part of the thrill was watching Robert Downey Jr. become an icon before our very eyes. Not since Johnny Depp’s Captain Jack Sparrow effortlessly stepped from his sinking ship and onto that pier had a film character created such a reservoir of a goodwill that a franchise was both inevitable and welcome.

So, likes “Pirates 2,” we eagerly anticipate “Iron Man 2.” As news dribbled out, a big plus was the return of the main players and the casting of Mickey Rourke as the villain, Whiplash; the big who cares was Don Cheadle stepping into the role originated by Terence Howard; the big minus was the casting of Scarlett Johansson and not just because she’s Scarlett Johansson. What she represents is the film’s second villain Black Widow (UPDATE: this may be incorrect. I was going by BW’s comic origin story. Sam Rockwell’s Hammer is either villain #2 or #3, depending on how the film uses Black Widow) and the whole idea of a second villain brings back unpleasant memories of Batman Returns and Spider-Man 3. Meaning, overstuffed plots with too much going on resulting in the lack of a focused story impossible to lose yourself in. 

Unless the film critic mentions the dreaded shaky-cam, reviews don’t normally have much of an effect on me. It’s just one person’s opinion, no less or more valid than the neighborhood mailman, crossing guard or the illegal aliens who take care of my yard. But when a review makes sense, when it locks a piece into place that was already floating ’round my mind, that’s when it gets my attention. And today’s review in the Hollywood Reporter diminished my expectations … some — which isn’t necessarily a bad thing: 

Well, that didn’t take long. Everything fun and terrific about “Iron Man,” a mere two years ago, has vanished with its sequel.

In its place, “Iron Man 2″ has substituted noise, confusion, multiple villains, irrelevant stunts and misguided story lines. A film series that started out with critical and commercial success will have to settle for only the latter with this sequel; Robert Downey Jr.’s return as Tony Stark/Iron Man will assure that.

Den of Geek is a little more enthusiastic, but in an exceptionally well-written review, they seconded the confirmation of my concerns:

Yet there’s no getting away from it: Iron Man 2 is a film that can’t quite recapture the magic of the first instalment. You can’t fault the fact that it tries: it throws as much as it can at you, admittedly stretching elements a little too thinly, but it’s doggedly determined to give you your money’s worth. There’s little doubt that you get it, too.

I’m sick of over-stuffed films.

One piece of good news is that over at AICN, Harry Knowles is gushing over the sequel’s “awesomery.” A great word and because I share it, I’ve always admired Harry’s movie enthusiasm, but our tastes are wildly different (though there was a moment of unspoken kinship over our mutual loathing of “Transformers 2.”)

Doesn’t matter, though. Nothing does. This is “Iron Man 2,” and when this sucker opens next Friday, I’ll be there — eager, excited and ready to fall in love with Tony Stark all over again.

This child-like anticipation which cannot be diminished by age, circumstance or a couple of troubling reviews represents The Magical Power Of Movies when Hollywood gets one right … and with “Iron Man,” Hollywood got one right, and then some.

Let’s start with the cast:  James Stewart.  George C. Scott.  Lee Remick.  Eve Arden.  Ben Gazzara.  Even Big Hollywood’s own Orson Bean in a supporting part as a doctor who plays a key role in the story.  If you love movies, you only needed to get to the word “George” before you were adding it to your NetFlix queue.

The plot is simple.  Small-town lawyer Paul Biegler (Stewart), who is more concerned with fishing than his practice, is talked into meeting Army lieutenant Fred Manion, who is sitting in jail for the murder of the man the soldier claims raped his wife Laura (The hotter-than-hot Remick).  Beigler takes the case, and faces off with Claude Dancer (Scott), the ace prosecutor sent in from the big city to chalk up yet another conviction.   There is much more to the story – the movie is a brisk two hours forty minutes long – but there’s no sense in going into the details here.  You just need to know this:  Jimmy Stewart goes up against George C. Scott in court.  Case closed.

The sparks fly in the courtroom under the direction of Otto Preminger, the enfant terrible of 50s and 60s Tinseltown, but the interesting part (at least for a lawyer) is that the film covers all aspects of the trial, in and out of the courtroom.  Cases are often won not in front of the jury but hunched over a dusty book of old cases (or, today, in front of a computer screen looking at precedent online), and Anatomy doesn’t hesitate to show the hard work involved in putting up a defense. 

That sounds dull as dirt, but Anatomy is anything but.  Stewart is helped by his burned out, alcoholic mentor Parnell, played perfectly by Arthur O’Connell.  His character is funny, irascible, sad and, in the end, redeemed.  O’Connell even manages to steal scenes from Jimmy Stewart while snagging a best Supporting Actor nomination for himself (Stewart and Scott both earned Oscar nominations as well).

–

Preminger was known for the pushing boundaries, and he does it again here.  This was 1959, and audiences must have been in for a shock not only hearing a frank discussion of topics like sexual climax and seminal fluid on the big screen but hearing it come from the mouth of George Bailey himself.  But it’s not exploitation – it’s reality, and there is nothing wrong with adults viewing adult subject matter.  If only films today were brave enough to put forward an ambiguous character like Laura Manion – perhaps a rape victim, but perhaps something else.  They’d be picketed by bitter, snarling feminists furious over the movie’s rejection of easy archetypes and easier answers.  And almost no studio today would risk the ending either – an ending that is a perfect fit for what comes before. 

The beauty of Anatomy is how it never treats its audience like children.  Its characters are fallible – sometimes they drink to excess, smoke, have questionable morals and lie, but the movie expects the audience to understand that human beings are not purely black and white.  That audience had come through three terrible wars and the Great Depression.  They knew something about real life even if most of what Hollywood was putting out was sanitized and saccharine.

If Anatomy was being remade today, those twit studio suits would probably try to push Josh Hartnett as Beigler, Scarlett Johansson as Laura, and some kid from a CW TV series about vampires as the accused.  It’s sad that there are so many mediocrities out there today, and sadder that the suits don’t even realize it.  No matter how hard she tried, the pretty but vacant Johansson could never get anywhere as close to down and dirty as Lee Remick does here.   And there’s no comparison in life experience – Stewart flew B-24s over Dusseldorf; Harnett looks like he bursts into tears when he runs out of his Axe body spray. 

The only problem with Anatomy in my book is the music.  It’s jazz, and aficionados of that art form hail Duke Ellington’s soundtrack as a masterpiece.  But if you feel that jazz is like a colonoscopy for your ears, the musical interludes can be downright painful.

It’s been a summer of sequels to lumbering blockbusters that should have never been made in the first place, twee romances between self-consciously awkward 20-something nerds, and big screen adaptations of “graphic novels” that demonstrate why generations of parents past declared comic books a pernicious waste of time.  Now give  Anatomy of a Murder a look – it is a reminder that not all films are aimed squarely at the half-wit demographic.

And let me make this perfectly clear, even if they do say Jehovah!

Sentence must be read before being carried out. And unlike Soraya M., the board members of the Asylum of Motion Picture Airheads and Stooges will deserve every rock that’s thrown their way. I also believe that, in light of events in Iran today, the following commentary will stand out in much starker prominence than it did when I first started reporting on them in early March, when Team Oscar first set off for the Unfriendly Skies of Islamist Iran.

The backstory. In late February, the decision by AMPAS (as defined above) to send the Nine Stooges to the fascist hostage-taking, women-stoning, gay-exterminating Islamic Republic of Iran (at that time, things may be changing) set me off hotter than a Kim Jong Il nuke. Five days after the gay rights infomercial Oscars, no less! My gay rights heroes.

Somebody give ‘em an Oscar! For what it’s worth nowadays. Sean Penn getting an Oscar for playing a gay rights hero with his sorry track record on the subject is like Yasser Arafat, Jimmy Carter and Al Gore getting Nobel Prizes. They just ain’t worth what they used to be these days.

But I digress. On With The Show Biz Trial.

For ten days and uncounted humiliating punkings in early March, Team Oscar was a national embarrassment and a disgrace to this country and people, and an affront to the innocent Iranians suffering under a yoke of oppression not seen since Hitler’s Third Reich. A yoke which they are desperately and bravely fighting and even dying to cast off even as we speak.

And now, despite all that transpired back then, and all that is happening now in Iran, AMPAS is looking to whitewash the whole affair as a Bob Hope and Bing Crosby Road trip! Not on my watch! Fat fucking chance! Can you imagine how Iranian gays felt, watching the same people who facilitated tearful speeches on “gay rights for everyone” socializing and galivanting around town with the very monsters who were hunting them down, torturing and killing them?

If that alone isn’t a stoning offense, then nothing is.

Some may consider my charges harsh, even unreasonably so. So be it. Brutal Injustice and rank hypocrisy bring out the Zarqawi in me. But I will present to you, Dear Hollywood non-Academy Readers and Fine Fellow Americans everywhere, the foul evidence at hand in toto.

When charges have been read, and sentence is to be passed, I will leave it to the rest of you stoners as to which direction your rocks should fly. But first, to put the matter into Supreme Court-like perspective, look at the precedent law upon which I base my charges and my case.

THE WORLD v. SOUTH AFRICA

In 1985, during the oppressive Apartheid era of South Africa’s all-white fascist regime, actors, artists, producers and many fine musicians like Little Stevie van Zandt and The Boss, Bruce Springsteen, united to make a statement against that racist government, which held Nelson Mandela behind bars unjustly for 29 years, and murdered noted anti-apartheid activist Steven Biko while in police custody. That murder was memorialized in the Peter Gabriel song of the same name.

In conjunction with worldwide sanctions and divestment of business from South Africa at the time, the musical statement made by that group of most talented artists, better know as Artists United Against Apartheid, was immortalized in the song Sun City, which became a smash hit worldwide. We all know the rest of the story. The white South African government eventually folded, and Nelson Mandela was freed and then elected to the presidency.

What were South Africa’s crimes besides just Mandela’s imprisonment and Biko’s murder? Officially enforced racial segregation and subjugation, violent repression and the banning of opposition political parties. Certainly more than enough justification for international outrage, and both official and unofficial sanctions.

Yet compared to the current theocratic Hitlerite thugocracy running the Islamic Republic of Iran, which the world is also widely sanctioning today, South Africa’s Apartheid government was operating an island paradise fit for Chinese Uighurs. In Iran, political empowerment is nonexistent, and has been since the 1979 Islamic revolution.

All the power is in the hands of Supreme Leader Ali Khamanei and the Mad Mullah Guardian Council. Reform was impossible. Any measure passed by Iran’s Parliament, the Majlis, deemed ‘un-Islamic’ by the Mad Mullahs could be overturned on review. The Church is the State in Iran. Like a nationwide Westboro Baptist Church from Hell. Only worse. Much worse.

Examples. Children are routinely executed, gays are hunted down, tortured and brutally exterminated, and women and young girls are stoned and hanged, even for the crime of being raped. Until international outrage interceded, as happened vis-a-vis Roxana Saberi, seventeen-year-old Nazanin Fatehi was awaiting a death sentence for the crime of stabbing and killing one of the three God-fearing Islamists who attempted to rape her and her niece in a West Tehran park.

Here is a 27-minute documentary that re-enacts the attempted rape and the unbelievably misogynist injustice which followed. Had the world not screamed so loud in outrage, Nazanin would have suffered the same fate as that of twenty-year-old Delara Derabi, who was hanged by the Islamic Republic only six weeks ago. Iran has held mass hangings as recently as May 14th. And given the official death penalty announcement for Mousavi protesters, many more may follow depending on the outcome of current events.

This doesn’t even take into account the fact that many in Iran’s terror-sponsoring Islamist extremist leadership, including ‘moderate’ Hashemi Rafsanjani and recent presidential candidate Mohsen Rezai, former head of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard and former ‘diplomat’ to Argentina, are wanted by Interpol for their involvement in the worst terror attacks in Argentina’s history back in 1994. An Interpol warrant was issued for Rezai as recently as May 22nd.

Here is a piece I wrote back in early March, branding the regime as today’s Third Reich. Look at all the horrific and barbaric evidence of crimes against humanity committed both at home and abroad, and you tell me if I’m overstating the case. Keep also in mind that Hamas and Hezbollah terrorists are now in the streets of Iran, beating and killing the same Iranians who have supported and patronized the Islamist groups for decades.

Taking time out from killing innocent Jews to killing innocent Iranians. No surprise there, since the regime already kills its own people on an assembly line basis. Even bloggers. Given all this brutal evidence of the Iranian thugocracy’s bloody track record which spans the globe, I ask you, Dear Readers of jurisprudence and humble advocates of human rights for all, how was the Islamic Republic of Iran worthy of cultural diplomatic exchange, and South Africa not?

They should be forming Artists United Against Insanity to oppose Iran’s theocratic thugocracy, not flying over for tea, fingers cookies, and film seminars! Disgraceful!

Charges as follows. Bear with me. It’s a longer list than you think.

1. THE FIRST PUNKING OF FAR TOO MANY

Even though AMPAS was promised no politics would be involved in the visit, Team Hollywood was no sooner off the tarmac at Khomeini Airport in Tehran than they were totally punked by the best punks in the world, with harsh demands for apologies and submission by Iranian leaders over the films 300 and The Wrestler, or they wouldn’t get to meet their Iranian film buds. Curiously, Team Oscar was allowed to meet with their Iranian counterparts shortly thereafter. My question to the Academy is this: did they apologize or not?

Iif you recall, what so outraged Iranian government stooges over The Wrestler was Mickey Rourke breaking an Iranian flag and tossing it into the crowd. Deliciously ironic, considering the desecration of our flag is a national sport with the regime. There was also a declaration by Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman, Hassan Qashqavi, that thirty films currently in production in Hollywood were ‘anti-Iranian.’

Civilized governments don’t act like that. Yet I broke the punking story in America to Drudge and Nikki Finke because I knew something like that was going to happen. I was looking for it. Hell, the regime has been punking us for thirty years! Ahmadinejad had even said Hollywood was devoid of all culture and art. Something’s Gotta Give. I must admit, however, that maybe Ahmie was onto something with that comment. Never thought I’d agree with anything the Little Hitler said.

Academy politics makes strange bedfellows, I reckon.

That infamous Punking Heard ‘Round the World should have proved to all concerned that President Obama’s attempt at diplomacy through Team Oscar was a horrendous failure, as all other efforts since have been. Like the Khamenei-led Death to America rallies in response to Obama’s peace video. Yet Team Oscar suffered that humiliation and degradation only to suffer many more. And the rest of us, since Team Oscar represented us over there as a nation as well.

Some were even worse, if you can believe it. In short, if somebody wrote a script like this, no one would ever believe it. But I already read the book. Been reading it since 1979.

2. TEAM OSCAR’S STOOGES TRAIN IRAN’S PROPAGANDA STOOGES

Iran ‘film industry’ experts, many of whom Stooge Team Oscar no doubt gave seminars to, gave their own previous film seminars on Iran TV on the Ziono-Hollywoodist conspirators for making such anti-Iranian celluloid slanders as Harry Potter, Chicken Run and Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest. And let’s not forget the Jew Disney’s cartoon conspiracy, Tom and Jerry. Also deliciously ironic, considering Iran exports child martyrdom cartoons across the Middle East, a business so thriving the BBC called it, in blackly comic Joker-like fashion, ‘booming.’

I can understand the cultural aspect Team Hollywood pursued. I even respect it. But in my opinion, given the circumstances, it was the equivalent of sending a cultural team to Hitler’s Berlin during the Holocaust. The real great Iranian filmmakers were all heel-ground. The ones who aren’t languish in Evin prison or are awaiting kangaroo court religious tribunals, like Iranian-American Esha Momeni, for the celluloid slander of interviewing Iranian women for a womens rights documentary for her master’s degree.

Filmmaker Tehmineh Milani was sentenced to death for her celluloid slander. Again, only international and, in Ms. Milani’s case, even domestic outrage saved her neck from the rope. Another filmmaker, the French-Iranian Mernousche Solouki, was thrown into Evin prison for the crime of stumbling across a mass grave.

Here’s Ms. Solouki’s recounting of the event. She still suffers nightmares from her experience in Evin. I read that, and other horror stories of the Gestapo-like Evin prison when Roxana Saberi was still there. Horrified me. I know her father must have known of that. He’s from Iran. He must know. They all do. I can’t even imagine how he felt with Roxana there. Again, the South Africa analogy.

Yet despite all those goings-on, Annette Bening took time out to tell the world how great women’s rights were in Iran. Which brings us straight to Team Oscar’s next great offense.

3. ROXANA SABERI AND THE SOUND OF SILENCE

Throughout Roxana’s unlawful detention, i.e. hostage status as a political pawn, and bogus conviction on trumped-up espionage charges, Team Oscar couldn’t have been more silent or unheard from than Roxana herself. Not one public message of support for either Roxana or the Academy during her unlawful detention in Evin, never mind anyone else in Hollywood except us right-wing extremists. In fact, the whole human rights-championing left-wing PRAVDA-like MSM and government pulled a complete disappearing act on Roxana right after Hillary demanded her release, like she was bad press for the Obamamessiah to be swept under the rug.

At the time, my linked article above generated twenty times more Google hits than the entire media coverage combined. It’s at over 7300 hits now, more than 100 times the number of hits generated on Google vis-a-vis coverage of Roxana in late March.  I’m still getting hits on it. I don’t think people can believe what they’re seeing still. But I digress. You get the point.

No public statement of support from Team Oscar for Roxana that I can find. Team Oscar member William Horberg’s Iran blog made no mention whatsoever of Roxana’s unlawful captivity, or any plea they might have made on Roxana’s behalf to Iranian authorities. I have to assume none was made. Perhaps the Academy could clear up that matter, too. Inquiring Minds Want To Know.

Knowing the King of Hearts-like unreality that resides in the La La Land of AMPAS HQ, it wouldn’t surprise me in the least to hear any of them claim credit for Roxana’s release in the future, or even for the green revolution going on in Iran today. If they do, just remember Annette praising the regime’s great women’s rights record while Roxana was still in Evin. For starters.

That should clear things up.

What was really depressing to me throughout Roxana’s Hostage Crisis was how few in Hollywood spoke up on her behalf, when no one knew whether she would live or die. That will forever be a black stain on those who profess to be the greatest human rights champs in the world.

4. OF STOOGES FOREIGN AND DOMESTIC

Perhaps the most vocal filmmaker during Team Oscar’s prolonged humiliation in Iran was domestic thugocracy stooge and new Team Oscar BFF Alireza Davudnejad, who wrote an open letter to President Obama claiming that the only road to peace, freedom and justice in this world was for the President to destroy all of America’s nuclear weapons and give up its UN veto.

Mr. Davudnejad also requested a schedule as to when those world-shaking peace, freedom and justice-inducing landmarks would be carried out. This, from a regime that foments war, writes injustice into its penal codes, crushes freedom with an iron boot, and races to build nuclear weapons they swear to Allah and their own people they’ll use on Israel just as soon as they’re built.

Now THAT’S Comedy! Fortunately, the President didn’t fall for it. If he had, it would have been the Punking Of All Time. No punking for Mr. Ali-Duh, but a gold star on the forehead for effort. Mr. Davudnejad did, however, manage to give a closing backhand to his new BFF, Team Oscar:

“My last recommendation is not to follow your previous cultural policies and avoid your Hollywood friends from playing any tricks to dominate the cinemas of Iran. The United States once removed Iranian cinema from the Iranian life with the help of the former dictatorship; and sacrificed our industry with the import of foreign films.

The fallen cinema of Iran has once again regained its footing with the Islamic Revolution and has been fighting to survive for thirty years. We will not forgive the enemies of this cinema wherever they are. By the way, which is harder, to relinquish the veto right, or to forbear the domination of Iran’s cinema again? You have a hard path ahead. I pray for you. Only the right path has no deviation.”

How about neither, Ali-DUH? Over my freakin’ dead body! Go sit on a projector!

By the way, you got all that, Sid, Annette, and the rest of you Ziono-Hollywoodist conspirators? No more tricks! Or they won’t even let you apologize next time!

Q. What was the difference between Team Oscar and Ali-Duh in Iran?

A. He’s a domestic film industry stooge.

Yet another degrading episode Team Oscar let slide. I guess they’re more on the M side of S&M. Seeing as they represented all of us in a diplomatic capacity, so were we. How does it feel? Mr. Ganis also stood by for yet another punking by the Director of Iran’s House of Cinema, one of many he seemed unfazed by. Some people are just gluttons for punishment, I guess.

As a comic relief sidebar, the culture ministers who approved Team Oscar’s trip were summoned before an angry Majlis, Iran’s parliament, to explain who let the Great Satan into their pure Islamist paradise. But that’s how it goes. Nobody is safe in Punkedville. Even the punks! No word on if the ministers apologized, but it was rumored Mr. Ganis couldn’t find his ministerial escort anywhere.

Hell, they’re the liberals in Iran! Fuggeddaboutit!

5. THE BURQA BABES OF BABYLON

It would seem that, as Team Oscar was reeling from their hot-off-the-tarmac punking, the Mad Mullahs used the opportunity to wrap up the goils like mummies in burqas. They may call it a fashion statement or cultural sensitivity, but why didn’t they make a bold statement by wearing Western dress the whole time, instead of looking like every other oppressed woman in Iran?

6. THE GENOCIDE PRIDE PARADES, or BOY, CAN THESE GUYS THROW AN O-BASH!

On March 6th, the same day Iranian authorities promised to release Roxana Saberi ’soon’ after SOS Clinton’s demand the day before, news broke of the ICC warrant issued for Sudan’s genocidal leader, General Omar Bashir. It was an insult, an offense and a crime against humanity (Majlis Speaker Lari Alijani’s words, not mine) against the Iranian regime’s BFF O-Bash.

In response, the entire upper leadership of Iran’s thugocracy, along with their Islamist Gestapo Blackshirt stooges from Hamas and Hezbollah (the same ones beating and killing Mousavi protesters this week), took to the streets of Tehran AND Khartoum, the very streets where the genocide was and is being committed to this day, to throw genocide parades for human vampire and Dear Leader Bashir.

Now, what should you do if you know your host country is officially celebrating the most abominable crime known to man in the streets below your gilded cages? Do you a. speak up in outrage? Do you b. hightail it out of Dodge as fast as you can? My answers are a and b. Team Oscar’s appears to have been c. keep the tea and finger cookies coming, Ahmie! Now I don’t know the law in that situation, so maybe some fine Hollywood lawyer could tell me. Is that being silent accomplices?

See, I believe genocide parades are a crime in themselves, as though other nations were celebrating Hitler in the streets of Berlin and their own streets, had Hitler been charged by the League of Nations for genocide during the Holocaust. But that’s just me.

SUBPLOT: I just read that O-Bash flew to Zimbabwe on June 10th. He’s wanted for genocide. Why is he being allowed to fly all over Africa and the Middle East with impunity? What, we don’t have aircraft carriers out there that could send up a couple fighter jets to escort Blacula to justice?

7. AHMADINEJAD’S WILLIE HORTONS

As a bonus, highlighted by Ahmadinejad’s condemnation of Hollywood as devoid of culture and art, and followed up by the summoning of ministers to the Majlis over Team Oscar’s invite, both Ahmadinejad and Supreme Asswipe Khamenei used Team Oscar as their Willie Horton in the recent elections. You know. Who let the Great Satan in?

So rather than fostering a liberalization of Iran, as they no doubt naively thought, they instead served as a political tool with which hardliners could beat moderates over the head with. Considering the extreme Islamist nature of Iranian politics (as least last week), they made the situation for moderates even worse. The only thing they didn’t appear to do was make the political ads themselves. But they did train the propaganda stooges who no doubt made any, if any were made.

Damage done either way. Hooray For Hollywood!

THAT’S A WRAP!

I suppose I could rummage for even more egregious offenses, and glaring or willfully blind oversights. But I have far more than enough to convict. If you seek more for purely historical reference, feel free to check all my linked articles above. You’ll find ‘em. My problem was trying to choose which offenses and oversights to pick from.

WILLIAM HORBERG FOR THE DEFENSE

Currently posted at the Academy website is the following prosaic account by William Horberg of Team Oscar’s late-term abortion of a trip to Iran: The Road To Isfahan. Let’s hear what he has to say in Team Oscar’s defense before we stone them. That may seem predicative of the outcome, but remember, these offenses took place in Iran. Islamist extremist rules apply. Got it now?

Actually, just check the link above. We’ll stone ‘em now and rule ‘em guilty later. I mean, come on people. Given the evidence, they may as well have been jumping up and down and screaming “Jehovah!” Time to get stoned. And if you’ve misplaced yours, here’s another one.

IN CLOSING

Now, I fully condemn the shooting of Dr. Tiller by lone madman Scott Roeder in Kansas, as all right-minded human beings should. But I would fully endorse the shooting of whatever single-digit IQ Academy PR doctors were behind this afterbirth. They Shoot Horses’ Asses In Hollywood, Don’t They? If anyone at the Academy had any brains, they’d be stocking up on ammunition like a right-wing extremist Timothy McVeigh-like Montana militia for that very purpose right now!

QUALIFIER: Yes, I’m kidding. No need to call DHS just yet, thank you very much. Besides, you’re as likely to find a gun at Academy HQ as you are a hymen on Heidi Fleiss.

Despite the current brain-dead off-the cliff lemming leadership at AMPAS today, I love film. I love Hollywood I even love the Academy Of Motion Picture Arts And Sciences. Always have. Broke my heart to declare war on them. I even told them so. But all the above is Casus Belli. Gloves are off.

The blackest irony of all? I was in the middle of writing a loving screwball comedy tribute to Oscar when the news of their trip broke! By the way, I even warned them that if they tried giving all this Iran shite the Red Carpet treatment, I’d pull the rug out from under them. And I know and they know I’ve caused a lot of PR damage already over their Iran trip, both here at Big Hollywood and elsewhere.

My Iran opeds since the PUNK’D piece on Nikki Finke February 28th are pushing 30,000 hits at one blog alone. Can’t anyone in this business keep their mouth shut? How stupid can you be? Are they total masochistic gluttons for punishment? Oh yeah, I already covered that. Drop that last one off at the Department of Redundancy Department, LOL! In the meantime, I’ll do my best to have the Nine Stooges ejected off the Academy board and into the Pacific.

Now, I’ve had some very juicy tastes of Tinseltown. The Red Carpet A-List circuit in Beverly Hills and Los Angeles. I’m not a Guild Member, but my first screenplay got a number of finalist nods from some of the toughest Emmy-winning and Oscar-nominated contest judges in Hollywood. And I got an option with it. I got some chops. And I’ve only gotten better over the years through hard work, practice and learning. I know that because industry pros doing my coverage told me so.

But you know what? As much as I wanted to trash that story and never write another word in screenplay format again, I love that script. Put a lot of love and time into it. Think it’s my best work so far. So does my writing partner. In fact, I’m going to finish that script very shortly. And I’m going to finish it in the spirit in which I started: with love, tenderness and affection, even towards Academy members I wrote into the script with boundless love that I totally detest now.

How? I call it professional detachment. Like sniping Nazis as I lovingly listen to Mozart. Best of, worst of. I don’t let politics poison my scripts. I’ll leave the Lefties to do that. I’d rather not bomb at the box office. And I’ll have coverage done by someone I know and trust networked into the industry like a spiderweb. If I get a nearly impossible grade of RECOMMEND and it doesn’t move, I know my self-inflicted film industry Hiroshima is complete.

But you know what, people? I’ll take as many of them with me as I can, just like the wounded Mickey Rooney in Ambush Bay offering Japanese soldiers pineapples. He had plenty for everybody. Point being, I won’t stand for this crap and let it slide just to sell a script. This matter goes way beyond film to me. Look at it this way. AMPAS spends four hours championing gay rights at the last Oscars, then flies off to Iran to give that gay-butchering regime its gold-plated PR kiss, even praising women’s rights in the most violently misogynist regime on earth? STUFF IT!

God, how I wished I lived in the era of the Hollywood of an earlier day, when the top stars flocked to the service of their country, instead of the service of thuggish and violent dictators like Chavez, Castro and Ahmadinejad. By the way, Sean Penn holds the Trifecta of Shame on that one.

Let me be explicitly clear that I believe extreme left-wing morons like Sean Penn, Danny Glover and Harry “Bananas” Belafonte are the minority in Hollywood. Squeaky left-wing wheels get all the grease. I know a lot of great people in the industry personally. And I can’t praise highly enough Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt, George Clooney, Mia Farrow, Jim Carrey, Gary Sinise, Robert Davi and so many great USO supporters like Saddam million dollar bounty-offering Bruce Willis, Scarlett Johansson, Jack Black and Ben Stiller.

There are really too many to name. But you know who they are. As to the distinct minority, I will quote my former Obama-like governor and liberal tank commander Michael Dukakis for the first time in my life: “A fish rots from the head down.”

Tom Hanks dares to call gay marriage opponents un-American? Well, if President Obama, most Americans and 52% of Californians are un-American for not supporting gay marriage, what is Tom Hanks and the rest of the Motion Picture Asylum guilty of for signing off on a trip to a regime that hunts gays online, raids gay parties, tortures them horribly and then hangs them from crane wires to die agonizing deaths that can take up to an hour, as they did with two gay teenage boys?

There’s too much blanket idiocy in Hollywood. Megan Fox, jokingly telling the Transformers to take out all the white trash to save the earth, the irony totally lost on her. The Twitter crowd at afterellen.com. Like Adrianne Curry, who calls Prop 8 a human rights offense, but remains dead silent on the holocausts against LGBTs in Iran and Iraq. Why isn’t Dustin Lance Black screaming to the skies about this stuff? I couldn’t find any evidence of him opposing the AMPAS Iran trip on purely humanitarian grounds. WHY NOT?

No. I, a straight conservative Republican screenwriter, offended to my very core by the savagery of Shiite extremist gay death squads in Iran and Iraq, have to be the one screaming to the skies about LGBT terrorists who engage in atrocities even the Nazis can’t compare to. Like super-gluing gay men’s anuses shut and pumping them full of diarrhea cocktails so the gay killers, some on our tax dime, can catch a few pious laughs as their victims endure unimaginable agony before dying.

No. I am left with the dirty jobs and lonely tasks of networking REAL gay advocates like Michael Petrelis and the Gay Patriot blog over these inhuman gay horrorshows. I am the one who has to research and dispatch gruesome reports to sites like BestGayBlogs.com, and LGBT orgs all over the globe like LGBT Network EU. I am the one left to scrape around for signatures on petitions at Iranian Queer Railroad and Iraqi LGBT to save the lives of Iranian and Iraqi LGBTs, who live in fear of torture and unimaginable horrors the incredibly spoiled toddler-like Hollywood Leftie morons and unmarried gays of California will never know.

As a screenwriter, I now know what it feels like to work under an offensive and idiotic oligarchy that is totally brain-dead and out of touch with the realities of the world at large, and those whom they profess to lead. In that respect, though I do not agree with them, I now understand the passionate outrage Lefties felt during the reign of the Bushitler. Like Michael Moore’s and Al Franken’s bloviations during that dark time, I do not expect my heated rants to impact my Golden Bubble-insulated industry oligarchy one whit.

In fact, I fully expect it to to earn me black marks and disfavor, the full McCarthy treatment they so profess to detest, yet practice every goddamn day. Ron Silver, anyone? But like the aforementioned Twin Towers of Leftie-ism, I care not one whit what the ruling establishment thinks. My anger is righteous and justified. In fact, it could not be moreso. What’s happening in Iran and Iraq are de facto gay genocides. What cause could be more righteous than trying to stop those?

Screw sexual conduct! They’re innocent human beings targeted for extermination. They don’t deserve that barbaric treatment. No one does, except the blood-drinking Islamist Gestapo stooges that are doing it all! If that revolution in Iran goes through and the people win, somebody Tweet them to hang on to all the crane wires. They’re gonna need a lot. For the Hamas and Hezbollah Blackshirts, too.

If my harsh words mean my film career is dead, so be it. In fact, if I came to Hollywood for no other reason than to address the horrific hypocrisy of so-called gay and human rights champs who are anything but (some like Bening and Penn even extremely damaging to those they don the mantle of Human Rights Champs for), or to champion the cause of Iraqi and Iranian LGBTs unlike any cause I’ve ever championed based on purely humanistic outrage, then I will feel that my life will have had meaning.

If I have helped to save the life of only one Iraqi or Iranian gay, I have saved the world entire. I can go to my grave totally at peace with myself. If I must bury my screenwriting career ahead of me, this is a small price to pay. So many others, like those now on the streets of Iran fighting and dying for the freedoms that are as natural to us as breathing, or risk brutal torture and horrific death merely for sexual conduct or being raped, are paying far higher prices than we most likely ever will.

In closing, I am resigning from Big Hollywood. I came here on a mission nearly four months ago to bring attention to all I have highlighted above. All the in-between was a bonus. And I do have a comedy piece in the hopper, which is rare for me. Haven’t had much to laugh about lately. Which is why I want to return full-time to screenwriting as well. There’s enough tragedy on Planet Earth. If I can use my award-nominated humor to inspire laughter and comic relief, then that is my main mission now. The rest I leave to the card deck of fate.

If I return, it will be in the cause of those who cannot speak for themselves. There is no shortage of hacks and pundits flame-throwing politics these days, and there are far too many not flame-throwing at all on issues that should enrage them beyond measure. As I am enraged today. Certainly beyond politics.

I do not need anger management. Like Johnny Rotten sang with Public Image Limited, Anger is an Energy. Righteous anger is what freed South Africa. Righteous anger fills the streets of Tehran as we speak. Righteous anger is why we Americans no longer say to each other, “G’day, Mate! ‘Ow about a pint and some bangers and mash? Got some up in me lorry! God Bless the Queen!”

In closing, God Bless The Queen anyway. And God Bless America. I say that as an agnostic secularist, okay? It’s good luck! And may God look down a lot more kindly on the poor LGBTs in Iran and Iraq. Perhaps, if there is a God, and I’m hedging my bets here, I hope his hand is in events in Iran. Maybe with a youth-driven revolution, LGBTs, filmmakers. students, dissidents, bloggers, and raped women need not fear for their lives anymore, or offered the choice of castration or death if they wish to remain gay.

What? Did you think Ahmadinejad was kidding when he said there were no gays in Iran? He said it with the same certainty Hitler said there were no Jews in Germany. The discussion is moot. I really hope to God that changes, as Iran itself seems to be right now.

We do, however, have a most powerful hand in Iraq. The gay killings must stop. The gay death squads must be disbanded with an iron fist. Just like Al Qaeda. Or, to tell the truth, I don’t care if Al Qaeda takes the place over. I would feel the same way if I were in West Berlin in 1947 and the locals were still hunting down and killing Jews. Let the Red Army move in.

Uncle Joe, they’re all yours! Bin Laden, they’re all yours! Let them ALL share in the terror they love with a religious fervor! OR, they can wise up and join the human race. If not, screw ‘em. Let ‘em go back to Al Qaeda torture houses and eating bombs for breakfast. I may not be gay myself. No, really. But must one be Jewish to be totally repulsed by Auschwitz?

Good Luck and Good Night, all. Peace. I hope

I knew they were going to get punked! They were going to Punkedville! In fact, I was so sure of it, I was the one who broke the story in the US off the French wires to Drudge and Nikki Finke.  One Hollywood Jihadi PR roadside bomb detonated. War Is Hell.

Look at their trip from my POV. I remember the whole balls-to-the-wall anti-Apartheid campaign from the mid-eighties. ‘I Ain’t Gonna Play Sun City,’ remember? By the way, wasn’t Little Stevie great in that video? Love him! Point being, if the racist South African apartheid regime was unworthy of cultural exchange, why was the gay-hanging, women-stoning, child-executing, blogger-killing, hostage-taking fascist regime in Iran worthy of a gold-plated Academy PR kiss?

But let us start at the beginning. I first started dabbling in screenwriting about ten years ago. Had a couple successes with short stories in years before, but started getting some movie ideas. Lot less words, too. Way less typing. So I’m lazy, okay? I admit it! Anyway, I got my first real success in Hollywood out of the blue back in early 2005, with a script I’d been working on for five years. My first.

Did very well in amateur competitions all over. Even passed a gauntlet of judges comprised of some of the top talents in the industry. Made the Top Ten out of well over a thousand scripts submitted to that contest, and it was a Big One! Yahoo!

My first Hollywood Scream. From here in New Hampshire. Probably could have heard me in Hollywood, too! Anyway, it resulted in a couple jaunts to the Friendly Skies of A-List Red Carpet bashes at the WGA Theater as a screenwriting finalist. Open bar! Something else to Scream about! Rubbed elbows, did the whole Jed Clampett thing, you know? Total rube first trip out. Duh-h-h! But I thought I was a lock in Hollywood now.

Took me a year of grueling pitching and marketing to finally option my script. Have finished two since, one of which resulted in my own ill-advised tangling with my two coverage providers, with whom I strongly disagreed on their assessments of my Great American Screenplay.

Know better now. They’re in, I’m not. There’s a reason for that. Got it. Regardless of the difficulties, and the fact that my option has since lapsed (not unusual for this vicinity), my successes with amateur contests and an option had me feeling pretty good. Inspired me to go forward.

My coverage providers and I are now BFF. On the same page. They even say now my work is getting much better. Dialogue, in particular. And that’s okay. We seek progress, not perfection. And more open bars. By the way, as a conservative Republican, I was a little shaky heading into the Lair of the Beast. Though very excited over the Awards Galas, I somewhat feared that one wrong word could end my screenwriting career very quickly. In fact, I was ecstatic to discover a total disinterest in politics with all the people I met.

And they were ALL phenomenal people, especially all the ground-level types like me trying to take off. Actors and actresses, filmmakers, fellow writers. It was all about living life and the dream, all the time. Better than Viagra. I could have no higher opinion of the real worker bees in Hollywood. And a number of A-listers that were generous enough to give my Jed Clampett the time of day. And let us not forget the Open Bar. Screams all around!

Had even more Screams at the 2006 Screenwriting Expo, to which I got a great Gold Pass discount as a Semifinalist in their competition. Alas, no Open Bar. But a Human Circus Par Excellence!

So here I am in the present day, working on my fourth script, IMHO the best of the bunch, a contemporary, high-concept, low-to-medium budget screwball romantic comedy that is actually a loving tribute to the Oscars and the Academy itself. Really crazy stuff, but all in fun. Treated everyone special, the Academy in particular. And I could not have been more inspired by the story, the concept and the absolutely crazy characters I had populated it with.

See, what REALLY made the Academy special to me were board members like Karl Malden, Eva Marie Saint, Producer Kathleen Kennedy, even the Great Fonz, Henry Winkler. Loved their work, loved their efforts for the Academy, and just loved who they all were, and are. Cream of the Crop. It broke my heart to have to use the instrument of my Hollywood dreams as a weapon of war against them.

I don’t want to rehash all that. It’s beating a dead horse now.

But any Hollywood illusions I had about some of the top names in Show Biz being the human rights champions they claimed to be have been thoroughly shattered. Dustin Lance Black has been dead silent on Iran’s Gay Holocaust, Penn even worse. Not only was Mr. Penn sending flowery Mad Mullah PR dispatches from Tehran, the epicenter of today’s Auschwitz for Gays, back in 2005, he now pals around with Hugo Chavez even as gays are persecuted in Venezuela. Some hero. Like this article states correctly, Sean Penn may not be a gay rights advocate, but he plays one on TV.

Like Annette Bening praising women’s rights in Iran, both have done extraordinary damage to the cause of gay and women’s rights there. Not only did they completely overlook or ignore the real horrors of modern-day Islamist Iran for women and gays, they gave that extremist Hitlerite regime its PR blessings with not one word of condemnation. And Team Oscar is just as guilty as they are, giving theirs and the Academy’s PR blessing to today’s Third Reich. None could deserve it less.

They may say they separated politics from art (and have), but in an all-powerful Hitlerite regime, there is no separation of anything from ideology. Not only does Iran have a film industry worthy of Goebbels, they’ve even sentenced filmmakers to death for celluloid slanders!  Iranian-American filmmaker Esha Momeni is now awaiting trial in Iran on the same charges.

What makes Iran worthy of cultural exchange and South Africa not? South Africa wasn’t sentencing filmmakers to death or exterminating anyone. Certainly not the gays Hollywood Heroes like Penn and Black so profess to represent.

And I said I wasn’t going to beat a dead horse. I’m a writer! Whattaya want?

All that said, I do want to praise, rather than bury, some top-shelf Hollywood players who could not be more honorable in their outspoken, and out-of-pocket, humanitarian efforts to help the helpless and make the world a truly better place, at least for some.

Jim Carrey. Angelina Jolie. Brad Pitt. Matt Damon. Don Cheadle. Jerry Weintraub. George Clooney (though I am upset that he didn’t slam Team Oscar for staying in Iran during this) and father Nick. Mia Farrow. The list in Hollywood really is a long one.

And all that doesn’t even take into account all the Hollywood heroes to our heroes in uniform: Bruce Willis, Gary Sinise, Scarlett Johansson, Robert Davi, Ben Stiller, Robert Downey Jr. and Jack Black. Again, far too many to mention. But I thank them all. Cream of the Crop Every One!

But boy, are the bad apples really stinking up the joint! And you can tell who they are. They visit dictatorships to fawn over strongmen like stooges once fawned over Hitler. They praise systems or heroes that are abject failures or worse while denying or deriding our own worthy heroes and endeavors. They talk a great story, like Penn and Black, but all it takes is a few Google searches to sniff out the BS.

By the way, Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chavez kicked Human Rights Watch out of the country, but still welcomes with open arms Sean Penn, Danny Glover and Harry Belafonte. Don’t answer, it’s a rhetorical statement. Although I do believe now Mr. Penn will make a great Stooge. Practice makes perfect. You can call it the Stalinovsky Method.

So there it all is. This officially wraps Adventures in the Scream Trade. Tired of the bad screaming. Wishing for a lot more good. All things considered, I’m expecting a lot more of the former than the latter. I can only say Thank You to John Nolte and Andrew Breitbart et al here at Big Hollywood for giving me this forum to address you, My Dear Hollywood Readers and Fine Human Beings Everywhere, on the important issues of our day.

And how to know BS when you smell it. Hell, I’m choking on it. Stinks to the Hollywood Hills!

Champagne Wishes and Caviar Dreams!